No, Robin Cook Did Not Say There Is No Al-Qaeda

Conspiracy crackpots and Islamic apologists have been sharing memes about former British Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, saying that there is no Al-Qaeda and then he died a week later. The implication is that he was killed for telling the world the truth about Al-Qaeda. Well, that’s all bullshit. Let us tell you why.

The Claim : Robin Cook Said There Is No Al-Qaeda!

First, let’s take a look at a selection of the many memes created over this hoax. There are some variations, but they basically boil down to this quote :

The truth is that there is no Islamic Army or any terrorist group by the name Al-Qaeda and any informed intelligence officer knows this. But there is a propaganda campaign to make the public believe in the presence of an identified entity representing the “Devil” only in order to drive TV watchers to accept a unified international leadership for a war against terrorism. The country behind this propaganda is the USA.

Former British Foreign Secretary ROBIN COOK28th Feb 1946 – 06th Aug 2005(Died while hiking in the Scottish Highlands a week after saying this)

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Again, all those quotes were FALSELY attributed to Robin Cook. He did NOT SAY that there is no Al-Qaeda. Now, let us prove it to you.

Fact #1 : Pierre-Henri Bunel Wrote That

The quote attributed to Robin Cook was actually written by former French intelligence officer, convicted felon and conspiracy crackpot, Pierre-Henri Bunel. In his 2004 article (circa April-June) on Al Qaeda : The Data Base, he wrote :

“In the early 1990s, I was a military intelligence officer in the Headquarters of the French Rapid Action Force. Because of my skills in Arabic my job was also to translate a lot of faxes and letters seized or intercepted by our intelligence services . . . We often got intercepted material sent by Islamic networks operating from the UK or from Belgium.

“Al Qaida was neither a terrorist group nor Osama bin Laden’s personal property . . . The terrorist actions in Turkey in 2003 were carried out by Turks and the motives were local and not international, unified, or joint. These crimes put the Turkish government in a difficult position vis-a-vis the British and the Israelis. But the attacks certainly intended to ‘punish’ Prime Minister Erdogan for being a ‘toot tepid’ Islamic politician.

“The truth is, there is no Islamic army or terrorist group called Al Qaida. And any informed intelligence officer knows this. But there is a propaganda campaign to make the public believe in the presence of an identified entity representing the ‘devil’ only in order to drive the ‘TV watcher’ to accept a unified international leadership for a war against terrorism. The country behind this propaganda is the US and the lobbyists for the US war on terrorism are only interested in making money.”

Fact #2 : Robin Cook Died A Year After The Quote

Robin Cook died on 6 August 2005. That’s more than a year after the article with the quote was published by Pierre-Henri Bunel sometime between April and June of 2004. So much for the claim he died a week after “plagiarising” Bunel… LOL!

Fact #3 : Robin Cook Was Foreign Secretary Only Until 2001

The fake memes implied that as the Foreign Secretary, or even a former one, he would have been privy to the “true nature of Al Qaeda”. But guess what – Robin Cook was only the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs until 8 June 2001.

Up till the 9/11 attacks on 11 September 2001 (3 months later), Al Qaeda would not have been on his radar because Al Qaeda never attacked a target in the West. Only after the 9/11 attacks did the British start taking Al Qaeda seriously, as did the Americans.

Fact #4 : Robin Cook : Al Qaeda Is Osama bin Laden’s Organisation

A month before his death, and the day after the 7 July 2005 London bombings by Al Qaeda-inspired Islamic terrorists, he wrote an article in The Guardian. Here is a pertinent quote :

Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies. Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Al-Qaida, literally “the database”, was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians. Inexplicably, and with disastrous consequences, it never appears to have occurred to Washington that once Russia was out of the way, [Osama] Bin Laden’s organisation would turn its attention to the west.

So in 2005, instead of claiming that Al Qaeda did not exist, he not only clearly said it exists, he called it Osama bin Laden’s organisation.

Fact #5 : Robin Cook Died Of A Heart Attack

Despite the claims by conspiracy crackpots that Robin Cook was assassinated by those who wanted to cover the “true nature of Al Qaeda”, he actually died of a heart attackwhile walking with his wife, Gaynor, and friends near the summit of Ben Stack in Scotland.

A friend who was there with him gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation for 30 minutes until a Coastguard helicopter arrived. He was still alive when they airlifted him to the Raigmore hospital. He died shortly after arrival.

The confusion may have occurred due to initial unconfirmed reports that he fell and broke his neck. That did not happen, and was corrected, but to conspiracy crackpots – all corrections are evidence of a cover-up.

SHARE TO STOP THE LIES!

Social media makes it easy to share something, and we love sharing with our friends. In fact, the more shocking a story, the more likely you are to share it, even if makes no sense!

Help stop the proliferation of such fake stories. Share this debunking article, instead of the fake stories!

Please SHARE this debunking article to stop the spread of this fake story!

Support Us!

If you like our work, you can help support out work by visiting our sponsors, or even donate to our fund. Any help you can render is greatly appreciated!

The article states:
“Echoing Cook’s statement, Bunel, a graduate of the elite St. Cyr military academy in France, wrote:
The truth is, there is no Islamic army or terrorist group called Al Qaida. And any informed intelligence officer knows this. But there is a propaganda campaign to make the public believe in the presence of an identified entity representing the ‘devil’ only in order to drive the ‘TV watcher’ to accept a unified international leadership for a war against terrorism. The country behind this propaganda is the U.S. and the lobbyists for the U.S. war on terrorism are only interested in making money.”

However the above article by Dr Adrian Wong misrepresents both Cook and Buneis statements and follows on by defaming Bunei without offering any evidence.

What both gentlemen states are that Al-Qaeda from the start was a western (CIA) construct initially used against the USSR. Thus it wasn’t an independent army but a proxy army doing the West dirty-work.

IF Cook was murdered it had thus nothing to do with the above quote. Opposition with the Iraq war? Maybe.